Do you think its strange that Asians are usually skinnier than other races, yet they eat a lot of carbs (rice, noodles, dumplings etc)

Could this be because:

1) they have very very low metabolic resistance
2) some carbs are not fattening (eg rice)
3) other reasons??

I'm doing atkins and have lost weight, but i'm just wondering about this because it seems a bit strange